--> ABSTRACT: High-Frequency Progradational Sequences in Leonardian Bone Springs and Victorio Peak Formations, Delaware Basin, Texas and New Mexico, by James W. Handschy and Peter R. Vail; #91030 (2010)

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High-Frequency Progradational Sequences in Leonardian Bone Springs and Victorio Peak Formations, Delaware Basin, Texas and New Mexico

James W. Handschy, Peter R. Vail

Leonardian shelf-edge carbonates exposed along the western fault scarp of the Guadalupe Mountains are composed of numerous high-frequency (fourth order) progradational sequences. Individual sequences occupy channels up to 1,000 m wide and 100 m deep. Lowstand sequences onlap the updip parts and downlap the downdip parts of channels. Highstand sequences downlap the entire length of the channels and onlap or toplap against the previous shelf. In both lowstand and highstand sequences, shelf deposits are massive, thick-bedded fossil grainstones that dip gently toward the basin. Slope deposits are wavy to horizontal-laminated, thin-bedded packstones and wackestones that dip toward the basin at angles between 15° and 28°; soft-sediment deformation features are common. Basinal facies are thin-laminated wackestones and packstones that dip gently toward the basin. The direction of Leonardian progradation in the western Guadalupe Mountains varied from N50°E to S70°E and apparently did not shift systematically through time. On seismic lines farther to the east, the Bone Springs-Victorio Peak interval is a third-order sequence that can be divided into lowstand transgressive and highstand systems tracts. These same third-order systems tracts are exposed along the western scarp of the Guadalupe Mountains, but they are more subtle than the fourth-order sequences because of the scale of observation.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #91030©1988 AAPG Annual Convention, Houston, Texas, 20-23 March 1988.